Representational & Figurative Art

Atmospheric Forest Paintings Look Like There’s a Glitch in Their Pixels

May 4, 2022 (updated June 24, 2022) Published by artistvenu

Polish artist Luiza Niechoda simplifies landscapes with her pixelated style. Inspired by the Pacific Northwest and Romantic artists like Friedrich and J.M.W. Turner, she creates striking renditions of verdant forests and misty mountainous backgrounds. Instead of focusing on the details, however, she prefers to use abstraction to home in on specific feelings.

Originally from a marketing and graphic design background, Niechoda decided to pursue painting full-time in 2018. Since then, her style has taken twists and turns, evolving from hyperrealistic windows covered in raindrops to expressive landscapes. “One of the big factors influencing my new style was definitely my education (I have an engineering degree in geodesy and cartography),” Niechoda explains. “I’ve decided I want my paintings to incorporate geometric shapes and my brushstrokes to be only vertical and horizontal.”

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The immaculateness of Andrea Mantegna

April 23, 2022 (updated June 24, 2022) Published by artistvenu

Andrea Mantegna, Martyrdom and transport of Saint Christopher, detail, 1454-1457, Ovetari chapel, Eremitani church, Padua.

The first notion about the city’s history imparted to every young Paduan during compulsory schooling is that the founder of the city, Antenore, is not under the graveyard dedicated to him. It seems essential for the inhabitants of Padua to be fully aware of the impostor who occupies the tomb of the noble Trojan founder of the Venetis. Crowds of children on a school trip to the historic center astonishingly look at the idolized medieval aedicule, wondering who exactly is buried there. Most of the time the reply to them is simply “a dignitary”–in reality, a Hungarian warrior should be the answer. Sometimes, these children are told that next to Antenore’s grave Jacopo Ortis also rests–known as Girolamo Ortis, he was a medicine student who took his own life in 1796 and famously inspired Ugo Foscolo for his namesake novel. Since ancient times, the presence/absence of its founder has been fundamental to the city of Padua, and it could introduce Andrea Mantegna’s passion for gravestones as “sweet and furious”–two adjectives with which Maria Bellonci pointedly described the temperament of the artist. Padua has always longed to possess its own origin and sought it out in the land.

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Treedom: Ron Milewicz at the New York Studio School

April 8, 2022 (updated June 24, 2022) Published by artistvenu

Ron Milewicz, Maple and Cedar, 2017, pencil on paper, 12 x 18 inches

The title of Ron Milewicz’s elegant show “Light Takes the Tree” reveals a painterly proclivity. Heinrich Wolfflin’s term “painterly” describes the foregoing of “tangible design” for luminous merging of outlines and volumes, toward limitlessness. ¹ Landscape moves easily in that direction—its individual aspects assembling exponentially into an indiscernible whole. Its parts in a work of art are bound by the artist’s compositional gestalt.

Milewicz’s ordered visions pace the viewer deliberately through clear ranges of space. In “Sugar Maple 2” the central tree holds as the eye weaves between trees struck by sunlight on the left, and shaded ones retreating on the right. Complex yet discreet configurations of figure and ground, activated by erasure of sky, play across the picture plane, as well as from top to solid shadow at the bottom. Balance is furthered by a tree at the opposite edge, and movement is anchored. Stillness prevails, the way actual scenes seem to suspend themselves before our gazes.

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Lavishly Textured Paintings Are a Candy-Colored Look at the Great Outdoors

April 3, 2022 (updated June 24, 2022) Published by artistvenu

Belgium-based artist Anastasia Trusova finds spectacular ways to showcase the beauty of the European landscape. Her creative practice merges decadent texture with bold color palettes to create lavish depictions of flowery hills, dense forests, and peaceful rivers.

Formerly a shoe designer in China, Trusova took up painting when she relocated to Belgium and needed a new creative outlet. Through experimentation, she developed her own unique style founded on prismatic hues and thick impasto. “Texture for me is an integral part of the picture. I use it to show volume and space and give zest to the picture,” Trusova tells My Modern Met. “Additionally, since acrylic does not yellow in sunlight, I can use it to play with lighting and shadows [on the canvas].”

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Vibrant Abstract Desert Paintings Celebrate the Vast Beauty of the Western U.S.

April 3, 2022 (updated June 24, 2022) Published by artistvenu

The beauty of the Western U.S. is alive in the work of artist William Haskell. The Santa Fe-based creative depicts the varied landscapes in this part of the country through striking abstract paintings. Featuring bold shapes and vibrant hues, the likes of mountains, cacti, and waterways help each piece communicate the inherent beauty of the desert, along with its vastness that makes it feel so wild and free.

Inspired by the terrain since he was a young child, Haskell is drawn to the intense light and shadow that can be seen in the chiseled canyons and among the brittle leaves of desert plants. He’s since developed a visual language that you’ll find throughout his works. “The dust devil or tornado is used as a metaphor for life and represents the change our lives and our world are constantly going through,” he explains to My Modern Met. “The dust devil has many different meanings to many different cultures but often represents ghosts or spirits. The cactus has such a beautiful and modern shape to me and is an ultimate survivor.”

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Black Ink and Watercolor Bleed into Hazy Creatures in Endre Penovác’s Paintings

March 16, 2022 (updated June 24, 2022) Published by artistvenu

Image © Endre Penovác

Serbian artist Endre Penovác (previously) wrangles the bleeds of black ink and watercolor in his shadowy renderings of domestic and wild animals. Sometimes delineating a talon or ear with thin markings, Penovác primarily allows the medium to run across the paper, transforming a housecat or chicken into a dreamy, phantom-like character. Many of the works frame the central animal with negative space and utilize the soft, hazy edges to evoke fur and feathers. Originals and prints of his paintings are available from Saatchi Art, and head to Instagram to explore an extensive archive of his ghostly creatures.

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Delicate Grayscale Watercolor Paintings Look Like Grainy Vintage Photographs

March 16, 2022 (updated June 24, 2022) Published by artistvenu

Artist Elicia Edijanto creates watercolor art with a nostalgic quality. Her compositions of solitary children, animals, and misty landscapes look like grainy black and white photographs or stills from a long-lost film. In actuality, they are painted with a grayscale palette.

Each of these wistful pieces blurs reality with dreams. Edijanto’s delicate brushstrokes capture the forms of people, creatures, and even statues but do not focus on the details of their faces or expressions. Instead, her figures are shadowed by the stormy depths of the setting, transforming many of them into anonymous, dark-grey silhouettes. “For me, my art is a cathartic release. It’s a way for me to preserve the inner longing for tranquility, innocence, and hope for a tender world,” Edijanto tells My Modern Met.

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Interview with minyoung choi on her dreamy aquarium paintings

March 8, 2022 (updated June 24, 2022) Published by artistvenu

bath, oil on linen, 110 x 120 cm, 2020

all images courtesy of minyoung choi

Animals, in particular fish, have always been a subject of fascination for Korean artist Minyoung Choi. on growing up in Daejeon, choi recalls the national geographic programs that fed her dreams and the fish tank in her family home that lit up her imagination. after spending her childhood drawing and painting, choi knew she wanted to work in the creative realm and pursued her dream with masters of fine arts in painting from both Seoul national university and UCL.

now living and working in london, choi has become known for her dreamy watercolors and oil paintings that intertwine surreal moments with real memories. in recent years, it’s choi’s aquarium and fish bowl paintings that have struck a particular chord, with the theme of captivity reflecting how we experience nature in contemporary life while inviting viewers to escape into a miniature world within a world.

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Painter Dominic Chambers on How Jungian Theory Shaped His Art, and the Transformational Role of Therapy in His Own Life

March 3, 2022 (updated February 25, 2023) Published by artistvenu

Dominic Chambers_Self Summoning (shadow work)

Just a year after Dominic Chambers graduated from the Yale MFA program, the world went into the lockdown of 2020 and he, like so many of us, turned inward. In a new exhibition of the artist’s paintings at Lehmann Maupin (through March 5), we witness Chambers’s reflections on his early life and his personal transformations over time in a series of paintings done during the pandemic era.We spoke with the artist about the influence of Carl Jung’s Shadow Work on the show, which is titled “Soft Shadows,” his literary influences, and his future plans.

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Learn How to Sketch Structures in This Comprehensive Class on Architectural Illustration

March 1, 2022 (updated June 24, 2022) Published by artistvenu

Do you admire architecture? One way to celebrate the things you love is to create art about them. But drawing a building can be really tricky. There are often many fine details that feel nearly impossible to get right. Well, not anymore. Artist Demi Lang has a comprehensive course on architectural illustration on My Modern Met Academy. Her online class is called Architectural Illustration for Everyone: Draw Buildings in Ink and Colored Pencil. It will take you step by step through her process of sketching structures; and when complete, you will have created your own charming architectural illustration.

Like all other classes on My Modern Met Academy, Lang breaks down this subject matter into bite-sized lessons. Over the course of three hours, you’ll learn about the tools you’ll need to work, how to select the right type of paper to use, and how to study the photo you’ll use for the project. The final assignment is a row of three buildings, which Lang will go through first in line drawing lessons, then inking over the sketch, and finally adding color to bring it to life.

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